My NaBlo posts are in the form of letters to my journal about my revision process. Along the way, I'll include Home-Made Revision Workshop posts, and my Friday Challenges..
Dear Journal,
Patience is a virtue - or so I'm told. But it isn't one of mine. Hmmm....I just thought for a minute and realized, that in some circumstances, it is one of mine. I am very patient with my clients. I am patient with older folks and younger folks - it is with myself I am not very patient. This, dear journal, is something I need to foster with my work. I'm proud of how I've kept myself from throwing True out there, into the cold cruel world, too early. Until the pitch the publisher - nobody in the publishing or agenting world had seen a bit of it. I really care about this work and don't want to rush it. I get anxious though - I want someone to pick me up and carry me into the land of published writers - but not by any other means than by having a book that deserves it.
Yesterday I had a bunch of clients and chores. I got no revising done. Today and tomorrow it is much the same. I might get part of a chapter put into third person, before I leave for work. I have to walk the mutt and hang out some clothes too - we are having a clear day and we have no dryer. It is imperative to use the elements when they are present!
And revising is a slow slow process - at least for me. I write without outlines, not knowing anything before my characters do, or only just. My first draft is me telling me the story. Like a teenager telling a movie plot, it is full of 'and thens' and 'after that the trouble started' and other goofy place holders. The last draft I did was clearing up, but there is still lots to refine - lots of gleaning to do. Finally, I know the story. I have it, and I can thank the false deadline of the pitch the publisher exercise for that. Now I want others to have it as clearly as it is for me. And that, my friends, gets done one blazingly tiny word at a time.
So, journal? Be nice to me, OK? I'll get to it - and my dream is that I have most of it done by the end of this month - ready for submission - but that might not happen - and I'll just have to let it be.
5 comments:
WE are on the same planet. One day it will happen, it's just a test to our patience.
Thanks and good luck.
I think it's fantastic that you've been so patient to this point! Your work deserves it.
I think it's fantastic that you've been so patient to this point! Your work deserves it.
Jan - No doubt about it; revision doesn't happen quickly. And if we did revise too quickly it wouldn't really be our best work anyway. Your journal will just have to be patient with you...
I think there is a good reason why patience is called a virtue!
Revision does take hours and hours and hours. If I want time to fly with the speed of light I edit and revise. It's my favorite thing to do with a story, but oh it goes so slowly.
I think it would be therapeutic to be able to hang out my clothes on these warm days. I envy you your clothesline!
Ann Best, Author of In the Mirror, A Memoir of Shattered Secrets
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